Sunday, March 18, 2018

On The Dragonfly, I will introduce myself and describe my background, after years of writing under a pen name. This includes the story of how I came to write Histories of Things to Come.

To expand HOTTC's original aim to tell a 'real time history' of the turn of the Millennium, I will develop more substantial research and vlogging projects, and take a snapshot of our world today. How are we sitting in relation to our history? How is technology affecting the remnants of the past?

These new Websites and social media pages will be part of book publications and the development of new projects.

This time last year, it was reported that Richard Branson offered Hawking transportation on Virgin Galactic to the International Space Station. In 2007, the famous physicist became the first quadriplegic to experience simulated zero gravity on a modified Boeing 727-200 and looked incredibly happy when he became weightless.

Click here to read my references to his work. If you have not read his books, you can listen to some audiobooks and films on his work, below the jump.

"The gem of the Cunard line, the Queen Mary, is seen berthed in New York in 1938, two years after its maiden voyage."

The BBChas reported that photographer Ian Wright discovered professional photographers' images of celebrities traveling on the Cunard Line ships in the early 20th century. The archival trove, held at the George Grantham Bain Collection Library of Congress and Cunard Archives. Wright combed through over a quarter of a million photographs to put together a book. His research reveals the celebrities of the 1910s through the 1930s as they traveled the globe in opulent and glamorous surroundings of these finely-appointed ships. Cunard photographers developed the photos in on-board darkrooms.

"As she arrives in America from France on 18 April 1925, actor Gloria Swanson smiles at photographers. However, she had been gravely ill in Paris during the preceding months, following an abortion that had gone badly."

The Verge reported yesterday that Amazon's gadget Echo has a virtual assistant named Alexa which has been laughing at users; it also refuses to obey commands and gives other weird responses. According to reports, the laughing does not sound not Alexa's normal laughter sound files.

Alexa sometimes does this when its owners are lying in their rooms at night in the dark. This "known issue" is due to "false positives" when the machine thinks it has been told to laugh ... maybe.

Amazon stated that they are working on a fix for this. Some users were skeptical and think that the Amazon is testing the psychological response on social media. Meanwhile, the hashtag #alexalaugh is going viral.